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Archive for the tag “abandoned buildings”

Post holiday depression set in soon after i arrived back in Melbourne. It has stayed with me for a long long time. Yes this is going to be one of those posts where people complain about not being back on holiday and not appreciating what they have. Sure i can go on and on about all the friends i am seeing after 5 months of holidays, but that’s no comfort. I miss Europe and the people there really miss Prague and the great time I had there.

With that said i have been doing NOTHING since back at home. sleeping 6 hours a day, playing playstation 3, and going out taking photos. The inspiration for photos has stopped and the dream of moving to Europe take over my thoughts. With lack of things going on in my life I have left things slip. my blog, flickr, and tumblr. All these things have slipped on the wayside.

But things are changing Big things are happening.

Here’s a few photos that I have done with the help of friends. Photos are the only thing keeping me sane at the moment.

This place has been one abandonment that i have always been interested in. the soviet feel of it and the mosaics on the wall have always appealed me to it. While traveing around europe the past few months i knew that i will see it at some point.
A plane to bulgaria and meeting some friends from Australia in sofia and a car is all we needed. we set off on a road trip to buzludja. we got there on the wednesday. had a look around this fantastic structure. couldn’t find a way in. spent 30 mins looking and wondering how to get in without breaking anything.

by chance a mate saw a way in. we needed some rope so we went to the local hardware store. (30 mins away) on our return it was too late in the dayto go in.

The morning had come along and off to explore this building. once at the top we met some locals who were looking at the sourrounding mountains. we chatted to the husband and wife. turned out he had gome to this building when it was opperational.

we asked him questions about it and bulgaria. he didn’t have a good experience of the place. he doesn’t like it. didn’t want to ask too many details. He also mentioned that it’s going to get renovated/restored soon but doesn’t know when when.

We went into the old olympic village here in berlin. Sure you can do a tour but that’s no fun. We wanted to go and explore it on our own and not pay the 12 euros to get in. We we walked around the fence to find a way in. The fence was down in one section and we were in. success.

Walked around for about 45 mins then we got busted by security and the guy who in charge of keeping it maintained. The head guy yelling at us and carrying on about how we aren’t allowed to be in there. Blah blah blah is all i heard till he mentioned he is going to call the cops. We told him that it wasn’t needed and we will leave.

NOPE. He called the cops and we waited for about 20 mins till they came. Mind you that it started to piss dwon with rain and he didn’t let us have shealter under the trees. The cops came and were awesome. They didn’t want to be there dealing with us and tried to hurry it up and let us go without an arrest.

The head guy didn’t want to let us go. He told the police to look at out photos on the camera.There were photos from inside one of the buildings and some from a window we had taken.Head guy kept tellnig the police that we were in that building and the cops kept telling him that we weren’t you could clearly see it from the photos. Then the head guy and the police walked away and talked for about 10-15 mins. one of the cops came back and said that he was trying to sort it out with the guy so we can leave. head guy was really pissed. He must have had a sleep

head guy decided to prosecute and we were taken to the police station in the back of the car. AWESOME!!!!!!!

At the police station the cops and us were talknig and making chit chat. They said sorry that they had to process us but they had to because they were called out.

it started raining again and lighting was beeing seen form inside of the police station. everready said something in german and asked one of the cops if it’s the right word for lightning. The cops said yes. I looked at everready and said “this isn’t the best time to practice your german” i laughted and so did everyone else including the cops.

so after two hours at the police station it was time to pay the fine. we didn’t have enough money on us. one of the cops was going to drive us to the ATM. as I was leaving i said to KoD ” don’t go anywhere, we’ll be right back” everyone laughed again.

while leaving being prcessed and as we were leaving the staion one of the police men said that he hopes this doesnt put of off germany and that we will be back.

that was our experience at the old olympic village because we didn’t want to pay the 12 euros.

WLGS had this site on our target for a long time. we got lazy and there was always next week to do it. this happened too often when we tried to organise a meet up to explore this building. A couple of us decided to go and explore ‘unicef’ before it got trashed by vandals and the graffers. This was one of the riskier sites that we had been to. It was situated on a live site. A live site for those that don’t know is a site that is still worked on or occupied by people or workers.

There were people working in the factory and driving forklifts just 20 meters away from the building. In order to get to the building we had to jump a fence that was on a main street. As we jumped the fence and avoided the people working on the site we made our way into the building.

It was just what we had imagined and more.

The beauty of the peeling paint and the natural decay is a really awesome site to see.

Revolving doors!!!!!

There was/ still is old computers and typewriters on one of the rooms.

I hope to visit this place when i get back but i doubt that it’s going to be the same. There have been signs of vandalism there as people don’t know how to keep a location a secret.

It’s all full steam ahead at camp murdoch. This week marks the last few days I will be working where I am. friday will be the last day and it’s not coming soon enough. Then it’s two weeks of sorting shit out and getting ready to go traveling for months on end.

First stop will be 10 days in Ukraine. 3 of those days I will spend with Mask and Kitten in Pripyat exploring the mecca of abandonments. Whilst in Ukraine there will be other outings to abandoned wonderlands that people have left to decay over the years. When our time is up there I am going to Belgium to drink beer and eat chocolate. when not drunk, hungover or on a sugar high I will take my camera out and visit the many of the wonderful abandoned buildings that Belgium has to offer.

This travel plan was all dependant on if I would get the visa to Ukraine. What seemed like months dragged out and the nerves were getting the better of me. Was my visa approved? why is it taking so long? why haven’t they contacted me? AGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!

The news came to me that it got approved. PHEW. No more laying awake at night stressing about a visa. Now I lay in bed dreaming of what is waiting for mask kitten and I in Pripyat.

Follow kittens blog as she’s a great person and tells a better story than me.

Mask and I met via facebook. A friend of mine was showing his friend (mask) the photos that i have uploaded of my urban exploring knowing that mask likes to explore abandoned buildings too. Mask decided to message me and we chatted via facebook messages for a few weeks. One day I messaged him after coming back from the Geelong power plant.

We decided then it was time to meet up and explore some buildings together. The day had come and we went out to a place in Altona. it was pretty good. I had been there before but mask hadn’t. we chatted, smoked too many cigarettes and took photos of the place. Then it was onto the next place. Bradmill.

neither of us had been here before. so it was pretty exciting for us. the area is massive with lots of buildings on it and imposing building that can be seen as you are driving towards the west gate freeway. We went into the biggest building first and then it was onto the smaller ones. One of these smaller buildings had all the doors shut and the windows were all closed. this made us more interested in going into it. walking the perimeter of the building checking all the doors and windows mask spots a window on the second floor that had a car blocking it from the INSIDE!!!!!

how did a car get so high and what was it doing there? this made is more determined to get inside. to cut a long story short we found a way in after 10 mins walking around it. To our surprise the building was littered with cars. We calculated about 250 abandoned cars in this building all staked one on top of each other with dust and bird shit over them. What a find!!!!!

other than the cars we found a laboratory and some pretty funky old computers.

This was a great start to a friendship that will see the two of us travel to Ukraine and spend 10 days there. 3 of those days will be spent in Pripyat taking photos and drinking vodka.